To everything there is a season
by AJ Morrelli
Summary: After tragedy strikes, Sebastian finds himself drafted into comforting a grieving Hawke.


General disclaimer that characters presented in the following are only borrowed from Bioware for the sake of telling the story, which is meant to entertain and not to be used to make a buck. I'm thinking we're well past the need for this, but contains spoilers for the "All that Remains" quest line and possible ones for the "Deep Roads Expedition," too.

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><p>"Is he here, Bodahn?"<p>

Even as he asked after the dwarf's master, Sebastian's eyes trailed up the stairs to the doors he could see on the second floor. He'd visited Hawke's manor a time or two, but none of his trips had taken him beyond the first floor.

"He's...ah...not really been in the mood for company lately, messer. Perhaps-"

"That's exactly why I'm here," Sebastian interrupted.

In truth, it had been Varric's urging and of Garrett's companions, he'd been the most likely candidate to check on his well-being. Anders and Merrill currently ran the risk of having a blade stuck in their ribs, Fenris wasn't the sort for it, Isabella couldn't entirely be trusted to keep her mind on the task, and Aveline was simply too busy dealing with the aftermath to keep business separate from her feelings on the matter.

"The door on the right, ser," Bodahn finally acquiesced.

"Thank you."

He could have figured it out for himself as soon as he reached the top of the stairs. Fang, ever loyal to his master, was stretched out in front of the door, head resting on his paws. As Sebastian approached, the mabari picked his head up and let out a soft whine.

"You won't keep me out, will you?" Holding out a hand, he let the dog sniff and nuzzle at his palm before giving him a scratch behind one of his ears. "I'm worried about him, too."

With another whine, Fang pushed himself up and moved to sit next to the door, now seeming fully alert. Giving the hound another scratch, Sebastian then rapped his knuckle on the door.

"Garrett? Are you in there?"

No answer, but he could pick up on the sound of shifting cloth, the faintest creak of the mattress under a change in weight. He tried knocking again but still received no answer. Trying the handle did no good, either, as it was solidly locked from the other side.

"Fine. Guess I'll just have to do this the hard way."

Crouching down in front of the door, Sebastian removed his picks from an interior pocket of his vest. Squinting a little in the low light, he carefully worked the tools into the lock, taking his time with the task so as not to ruin the mechanism completely. He half expected Garrett to open the door during the middle of his task and demand to know what in the Maker's name he was doing, but no interruption came, save a curious whine from the hound beside him.

Once he'd manipulated the lock, he stood up and rubbed his aching knees. Tucking the picks away, he tried the knob once again and felt it give this time. Easing the door open, he waited a heartbeat before slipping into the room.

No light filtered in from the windows, even though it was well into the afternoon. The curtains had been drawn tightly shut and no candles or lamps burned within. There was a faint glow from the embers of a dying fire but it was hardly enough to see by. Still, his other senses told him plenty of what he needed to know.

Garrett was still on his bed, the covers rustling with his faint movements. The room itself smelled strongly of ale, wine, and cold porridge. As he crossed the floor, his feet barely missed tangling up in something. From the weight of it as he nudged it aside, it was the man's armor, left where he likely stripped out of it. There was the smell of blood still on it. Maker, had he done nothing since coming back but drink?

"Locked usually means stay out," growled a voice from beneath the covers.

"Which is fine and good when you want privacy. Not when you're drinking yourself into a stupor and not eating."

"Get out, Sebastian. If I wanted company, I'd be with Isabella."

"Something tells me that's not the kind of company you need right now, Hawke." He strode a little closer to the bed. "But we...all of us...are wor-"

"Shut up!" Garrett hissed. "I don't need your sympathy!"

"You certainly need something. You've been holed up in here for a week now."

"So what? The sun doesn't need me to coax it out of the sky. The world will move on without me needing to be in it."

"Garrett, you can't-"

"Don't tell me what I can and can't do! If I want to stay in here and get so sodding drunk that I can't remember my own name, I'll very well do it!"

He was up now, and very awake. And very angry. Seizing something from the table beside the bed, he hurled it in the archer's direction. Dodging to the side, Sebastian identified it as formerly a clay mug as it hit the wall behind him and shattered.

Closing the distance between the two of them before the other man could throw something else at him, Sebastian came to a stop beside the bed, carefully placing himself between Garrett and the contents of the table behind him.

Green eyes glared up at him from loose strands of blonde hair. "Move, Vael."

"I don't think so."

As Garrett reached out for something else to toss at him, Sebastian clamped a hand on his wrist, forcing it downward. He let the other man jerk free, him being just sober enough to realize that he wasn't going to be able to hurl more than insults at the prince.

The other rogue rolled up to a sitting position, blankets hiked up to his waist but not obscuring the fact that he sat cross-legged beneath them. Scrubbing at his face with his hands, he scratched his nails through his hair. "What's so urgent that you had to force your way into my room for?"

Letting out a sigh, Sebastian settled himself on the edge of the bed, sitting so that they were facing one another. "You, Hawke. I was worried about you."

Garrett let out a bit of a snort. "I'm a grown man. I don't need a nursemaid."

"Isabella doesn't seem to think so." A little grin quirked at the corner of Sebastian's mouth. "I'm just...worried. After what just happened-"

The blonde flinched, a tight look coming to his face. Sebastian watched the covers twist beneath a tight fist. "Don't." The word came out low. And angry.

"I thought you might appreciate a sympathetic ear."

Garrett refused to look up at him. "I don't need sympathy." The words came out slow, each one forced past his lips.

Pity. He thought that's what he was offering. Instead, it was meant as a kinship. Shared sorrow. Of all of them, Sebastian was the one that knew Hawke's pain the best. He knew well the anguish that he was going through.

"What do you need?" The question was gentle, meant to keep him talking to him, at the very least.

"I need-" He picked his head up, green eyes pinched, blinking away the shine that he caught in them. It was a fleeting moment of raw emotion on the other man's face. Garrett had never looked so young. Or so lost. "I need her back, Sebastian." Dropping his head into his hand, he strove to muffle the sobs that shook him.

Easing a little closer, Sebastian reached out slowly, letting his fingers just brush through the strands of the other's hair. Garrett had never been pious. None of his sermons, none of the Chant, would offer him any comfort. He would deafen himself to any such speeches. Instead, he drew on his own feelings.

"It hurts," he began quietly. "Thinking if you'd been there, could it have been stopped? That...helpless feeling...that you weren't there to protect them. Would your blade have made a difference? Would dying alongside them have been less painful than mourning?"

Drawing away from his touch, Garrett lay down again, curling himself up beneath the covers as if he were trying to hide from his own thoughts. "I was there," he breathed out. "I was there for all of them. And there was nothing I could do." He shook his head. "There was nothing I could do."

Sebastian cocked his head to the side slightly. "All of them?" he asked gently, almost afraid that he'd push too far with the question.

"Carver. The big, dumb, bloody fool. He had to be the hero. If he hadn't charged, we could have...together we could have-"

Brow furrowing slightly, Sebastian tried to recall the name. This was the first time Garrett had spoken it, but it was obviously something else that weighed heavily on his mind. Reaching out, he let his hand rub soothingly between Hawke's shoulders. After feeling the tension start to ease from them, he ventured the question of "What happened to him?"

"Lothering. We were fleeing from the darkspawn and they surrounded us. Then...Then there was an ogre. I...called to him to watch out. To wait. We could have taken it down together. If we'd worked together. But he...he always had to...Always felt in my shadow. Always my little brother."

Many lost family during the Blight, but that fact didn't make things any easier. Being the younger sibling, Sebastian knew what it was like to wish for the greatness your elders had. It had been what had driven him to act out as he did. He could understand Carver's bravado, but he also knew it was in an older sibling's nature to watch out for the younger, no matter how much they annoyed you.

"You couldn't have known his mind. You were in battle. Even you know that it's impossible to be everywhere at once." His hand drifted up again, combing Garrett's hair, letting his nails scratch lightly along his scalp.

"I kept telling myself that maybe he didn't hear me. Everything seemed so loud. And then it...it...I just remember seeing it swing its arm and he suddenly wasn't there anymore. He was far away. So far away. I just...I charged it and then all I remember is my mother weeping. Crying for her little boy."

"And you, Garrett?" he asked gently.

Another shake of the head. "There were more darkspawn to kill. And I had to get the rest of my family to safety. Aveline and Wesley, too. I had to keep them moving."

"At the cost of your mourning." Another feeling he knew all too well. A prince wasn't given the luxury of tears. He had to be strong. For his people. For those that had been left behind. It was only rare moments like these that leaders could allow themselves to be what they longed for: family. "There's no shame in it now, Garrett. Both were taken from you too soon. That you can mourn for them shows how much you loved them."

"But I still couldn't save them." Agony filled those words. "After Carver died, I had to be the strong one. I had to be the one that protected them. She trusted me to protect her. And I failed her. Again."

"You had no way of knowing. The man who took her, you couldn't have known his mind. Couldn't have known she was a target."

"Not my mother. Bethany. Bethany, too."

Bethany. Hawke's sister. He'd met her once, briefly. There were whispers that she was an apostate, something very dangerous to be in Kirkwall. That he hadn't seen her, well, he wasn't about to ask why. He simply assumed that the Templar had discovered the truth and she'd been taken to the Circle.

Garrett continued, unaware of his thoughts. "My mother all but begged me to take her with us on the expedition. She was a strong mage. Talented. I'm not afraid to admit that. Not anymore. We were...We were nearly out. And she called to me. Asked me to wait. I turned and...and she...fell. It was...more darkspawn. Their poison got into her blood."

"Oh, Hawke," Sebastian breathed. He'd been spared the horrors of the Blight firsthand, including the sickness that the foul creatures spread, but being among the Chantry, he had heard enough stories. It was a painful death if allowed to run it's course. And he knew there was no way Garrett would have let his sister suffer.

To lose both of his siblings to the darkspawn and now his mother to an insane mage, Sebastian could understand why Garrett had wanted to make it so he couldn't feel anything. Being numb was better than feelings of helplessness; better than sorrow.

He felt an arm wrap around his waist, the nuzzle of a cheek against his thigh, the feeling causing him to start slightly. Garrett had rolled over and was hugging him as best he was able with him still sitting up as he was. Laying a hand on top of his head once again, he just stroked his hair. His sobs had quieted, but he knew that after that would come exhaustion.

"Stay. Please," he heard murmured.

"Of course."

Though Garrett couldn't see it, he smiled gently. His fingers moved, brushing at the back of the other man's neck and circling between his shoulders again. As they sat there, he began to sing softly, a lullaby he remembered from when he was a child. It wasn't long before Hawke's back began to rise and fall with the steady pace of slumber.

Letting out a sigh, he eased back as best as he could, trying to grow comfortable after surrendering himself to the fact that he was going to have to remain here until Garrett woke. As he did so, the blonde shuffled in his sleep, making it easier for him to stretch out beside him. He soon found his chest being used for a pillow this time, though it was a little more comfortable than how they'd been before.

Curling his arm around the other's back, he brought his other hand up, brushing errant strands of hair away from Garrett's face. The action earned him a content sigh and a slight squeeze around his waist.

"May you find peace, my friend," Sebastian whispered softly. "And know that you can always seek it here, with me."


End file.
